Note 23 — Chapter X · Difficulties of the Folklorist

Lastly, the chronological indications of the crushing of the power of the Goidels, and the incipient merging of that people with the Brythons into a single nation of Kymry or ‘Compatriots,’ are worthy of a passing remark. We seem to find the process echoed in the Triads when they mention as a favourite at Arthur’s Court the lord of Arỻechweđ, named Menwaeđ, who has been guessed, p. 507 above, to have been a Goidel. Then Serrigi and Daronwy are signalized as contemporaries of Cadwaỻon Law-hir, who inflicted on the former, according to the later legend, the great defeat of Cerrig y Gwyđyl23. The name, however, of the leader of the Goidels arrayed against Cadwaỻon may be regarded as unknown, and Serrigi as a later name, probably of Norse origin, introduced from an account of a tenth century struggle with invaders from the Scandinavian kingdom of Dublin24. In this conqueror we have probably all that can be historical of the Caswaỻon of the Mabinogion of Branwen and Manawyđan, that is, the Caswaỻon who ousts the Goidelic family of Ỻyr from power in this country, and makes Pryderi of Dyfed pay homage to him as supreme king of the island. His name has there undergone assimilation to that of Cassivellaunos, and he is furthermore represented as son of Beli, king of Prydain in the days of its independence, before the advent of the legions of Rome. But as a historical man we are to regard Caswaỻon probably as Cadwaỻon Law-hir, grandson of Cuneđa and father of Maelgwn of Gwyneđ. Now Cuneđa and his sons, according to Nennius (§ 62), expelled the Goidels with terrible slaughter; and one may say, with the Triads, which practically contradict Nennius’ statement as to the Goidels being expelled, that Cuneđa’s grandson continued the struggle with them. In any case there were Goidels still there, for the Book of Taliessin seems to give evidence25 of a persistent hostility, on the part of the Goidelic bards of Gwyneđ, to Maelgwn and the more Brythonic institutions which he may be regarded as representing. This brings the Goidelic element down to the sixth century26. Maelgwn’s death took place, according to the oldest manuscript of the Annales Cambriæ, in the year 547, or ten years after the Battle of Camlan—in which, as it says, Arthur and Medrod fell. Now some of this is history and some is not: where is the line to be drawn? In any case, the attempt to answer that question could not be justly met with contempt or treated as trivial.